Perception of Nurses about Palliative Care: Experience from South-West Nigeria

Background: Nurses play a major role all over the world in the palliative care team.Aim: The aim of this study was to investigate the knowledge and attitude of nurses toward palliative care in a tertiary level hospital in Nigeria. Subjects and Methods: Setting: This cross-sectional questionnaire-based study was carried out among nurses at a tertiary health care facility inAdo-Ekiti, South-West Nigeria. Design: A cross-sectional questionnaire-based study was carried out. The questionnaire sought information about the sociodemographic profile of respondents, their knowledge of definition and philosophy of palliative care among other things. Descriptive statistics was used to obtain the general characteristics of the study participants, while Chi-square was used to determine the association between categorical variables. A two-sided P < 0.05 was considered as significant.Results: A total of 100 questionnaires were returned with a female preponderance among the respondents with F: M ratio of 9:1. Regarding the definition of palliative care, 71.8% (48/66) of the respondents  understood palliative care to be about pain medicine, 55% (33/60) thought it to be geriatric medicine, while 90.2% (83/92) felt palliative care is about the active care of the dying. Exactly 80.5% (66/82) respondents agreedthat palliative care recognizes dying as a normal process while 84.1% (74/88) respondents were of the opinion that all dying patients would require palliative care. The use of morphine would improve the quality of life of patients according to 68.9% (42/61) of respondents.Conclusion: There are gaps in the knowledge of healthcare workers in the area of palliative care and this call for a review of the current nursing curriculum and practice guidelines in Nigeria.Keywords: End of life, Nursesf attitude, Pain management, Palliative car

Spectrum of Gunshot Injuries in Civilian Practice at a Tertiary Hospital in a Semi-rural Community in Nigeria

Background: Gunshot injuries are common. Political and ethno-religious conflicts have made injuries from ballistics now commonplace in Nigeria. Data was collected prospectively at Federal Medical Centre Owo, South Western Nigeria from September 2007 to August 2011. The objective was to highlight the nature of gunshot wounds, patients’ and gun  characteristics, and document the outcome of treatment upon discharge.Methods: All patients with gunshot injuries (GSI) admitted via the emergency room (ER) of the hospital. Outcome measures included the status upon leaving the hospital: Alive and discharged home without disability; alive and discharged home with some disability; discharged against medical advice; referral to another hospital and death. Data was analyzed using SPSS17 programfor frequencies, measure of central tendencies and relationships.Results: A total of 139 patients were seen. Males accounted for 94.2% of the victims. The ages ranged from 12 to 70 years (mean = 33.14 years); modal age group was 21-40 years (76.3%). High velocity injuries were common (59%). Armed robbery (56.1%), accidental discharge (20.1%) and assault (11.5%) were major sources. Injuries involved the limbs (54.7%), trunk (10.1%), and > one region (22.3%). About 62% of cases presented within 8hours of injury. The mortality and limb deformity rates were 5.8% and 14.4% respectively. Outcome of treatment depended on promptness of definitive care and the nature of injuries at presentation (p= 0.001 and p=0.026 respectively).Conclusion: Injuries from high velocity guns were common. Armed robbery, assault and accidental discharge from law enforcement agents were the major sources. Outcome was dependent on the nature of injuries and the promptness of intervention.Keywords: Injuries, Civilian, Gunshot

Case Report: Pneumomediastinum and Subcutaneous Emphysema Complicating Acute Exacerbation of Bronchial Asthma

No Abstrac

Soft tissue sarcoma of the thigh: Need for angiography in the developing

No Abstract

Torsion of the testis - a diagnosis that should not be misses case report

No Abstract. Nigerian Medical Practitioner Vol. 49(3) 2006: 52-5

Non-cardiac Surgery in a Child with Major Congenital Heart Disease: A Challenge to Safe Anaesthesia

Surgery in children with congenital heart disease poses an increased risk of morbidity and mortality. Ideally such children should be managed in specialist cardiac centres. However, it is not unusual in developing countries for the patients to present in non-specialist centres. This was the case with a 5 month old baby who presented at our hospital with a major and severe cyanotic congenital cardiovascular anomaly for the repair of a bilateral complete cleft lip. The parents declined referal to a specialist cardiac centre. The surgery was successfully done under general anaesthesia despite the limited facilities. It is important that all anaesthetists are familiar with the basic principles involved in the management of these patients. Appropriate cardiologist consultation and close collaboration between the surgical, anaesthetic and nursing teams, is also critical to a successful outcome. Keywords: Anaesthesia, non-cardiac surgery, congenital heart disease, non-specialist cardiac centre, limited facilities

Genetic diversity in Nigerian brinjal eggplant (Solanum melongena L.) as revealed by random amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD) markers

The taxonomy of Solanum melongena L., also known as brinjal eggplant, has remained difficult because previous studies to establish genetic relationships among taxa are mainly based on morphological features, which are insufficient to establish genetic affinities. In the present investigation, five highly polymorphic random amplified polymorphic DNA primers were used to describe the genetic similarity and diversity among its accessions in Nigeria. The results show a high level of polymorphism based on the banding patterns among the samples. This indicated a wide and diverse genetic base. Four distinct clusters were equally noticeable at a coefficient of 0.80 from the dendrogram generated. Generally, the grouping pattern clearly indicates that irrespective of variations in fruit traits among samples, they were still grouped together in different clusters with a high similarity coefficient value. This probably showed some genetic relatedness/closeness among the samples concerned. The study also revealed that there is no association between RAPD pattern and the geographic origin of accessions. These agreed with previously published data on the characterization of eggplant. The study disclosed that molecular methods coupled with morphological analyses could make proper classification of S. melongena and other Solanum species in Nigeria possible to achieve.Keywords: Eggplant, random amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD), Data, polymorphism, taxonomyAfrican Journal of Biotechnology, Vol 13(21) 2119-212